Iivo Nei and Andreas Dueckstein awarded Honorary GM titles

Press release by FIDE

The FIDE Council awarded the title of Honorary Grandmaster to Andreas Dueckstein (Austria) and Iivo Nei (Estonia) for their consistently strong results in the 1950s-70s. Currently, the FIDE Historic Commission is working on unified criteria for awarding the title of Honorary Grandmaster.

Below are a few words about the awardees, summarizing their careers and achievements.

Ivo Nei

Master Class Vol.15 - Viktor Korchnoi and My life for chess

In this video course, experts (Pelletier, Marin, Müller and Reeh) examine the games of Viktor Korchnoi. Let them show you which openings Korchnoi chose to play, where his strength in middlegames were, or how he outplayed his opponents in the endgame.

Photo: Ingmar Muusikus

Born on 31 October 1931 in Tartu, Estonia, Iivo Nei started playing chess inspired by his great compatriot Paul Keres. At the beginning of his career, Nei made a name for himself, finishing third in a very strong USSR Juniors Championship (Leningrad, 1947) and tying for first with Korchnoi in the same event a year later (Tallinn, 1948).

An eight-time Estonian champion (1951, 1952, 1956, 1960–1962, 1971, and 1974), Iivo won the Baltic Republics Championships in 1961 in Palanga, in 1962 in Tartu, in 1963 in Estonia, and in 1964 in Pärnu.

His major break came in 1964 when he tied for first with Paul Keres in Beverwijk (Hoogovens tournament, later known as Corus and then as Tata Steel) ahead of Portisch, Ivkov, Larsen and Parma. He later achieved solid results in Beverwijk 1966 (5^th), Zinnowitz 1966 (4^th-6^th) and Tallinn 1969 (2^nd-3^rd).

Still an active player, Iivo Nei productively worked with Nona Gaprindashvili and Maia Chiburdanidze as an assistant and was notably one of Boris Spassky’s seconds in the 1972 World Championship match. He later coached GM Lembit Oll.

For many years, Iivo Nei served as FIDE representative in Zone 1.7 (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania)

A popular author, he penned several books in Estonian and German.

Notable games

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Andreas Dueckstein

Master Class Vol.10: Mikhail Botvinnik

Our experts show, using the games of Botvinnik, how to employ specific openings successfully, which model strategies are present in specific structures, how to find tactical solutions and rules for how to bring endings to a successful conclusion

Photo: kurier.at

Born on August 2, 1927, in Budapest, Andreas Dueckstein moved to Austria at 22 and quickly became one of the country’s strongest players, winning the national championship thrice (1954, 1956, 1977).

Andreas represented Austria in seven Chess Olympiads from 1956 to 1988, notably taking individual gold in Moscow (1956) and Nice (1974), both times playing on the second board. Following his strong performance in Moscow (1956), he was awarded the IM title.

Regarded as a dangerous attacking player in his prime, Dueckstein scored victories over formidable opponents such as Max Euwe, Mikhail Botvinnik (who was the reigning World Champion at that time), and Bent Larsen.

Over his long and successful chess career, Dueckstein built a good tournament record: 5^th at Hastings (1958/59), shared 2^nd at Zonal in Berg en Dal (1960), 4^th–6^th at Vienna (1961), 3^rd at Amsterdam IBM (1964), 4^th at Palma de Mallorca (1965), 6^th-7^th in Havre (1977).

Notable games

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Improve your pieces - a winning system you need to know

In this course, we will learn how to identify passively placed pieces in any given situation and how to improve their health by bringing them into active squares.

Links

• Ten Trivia about the Tata Steel Tournament series, the Wimbledon of Chess
• Vlastimil Hort: Remembering Paul Keres
• Bamberg 1968: Keres wins tournament and final round!